Media Release

Media Release Post National Education Forum

24 April 2007

Forum calls for review of country kids’ education allowances

Federal and state governments must review all education allowances for country kids as a matter of urgency, leading rural education advocates and academics have warned.

They said kids in rural and remote areas, whose families were affected by drought, could miss out on education altogether and that allowances and their conditions must be reviewed and adjusted before the start of the next school year.

National Foundation for Rural and Regional Renewal chairman Ian Sinclair said the nation, including governments and business, must act now.

“There are a number of very urgent things that need to be done,” Mr Sinclair said.

“We need to provide additional funds to keep country kids at schools and at boarding schools.”

Mr Sinclair was speaking at the end of a forum on rural, remote and regional education in Albury which attracted parents, teachers and community and government representatives from across the nation.

The forum called for:

Financial boosts for remote home-schooling parents to pay volunteer tutors
Immediate support to help those not reaching literacy and numeracy benchmarks
Review to ensure that country kids who receive scholarships don’t have other allowances cut accordingly.
Kids who have to leave home to attend university automatically be eligible for the Independent (Living Away from Home) Youth Allowance.
Help to form a national rural education organisation
Strategies to promote outstanding education practices for country kids
Review of the conditions and amounts of all education allowances

“There is a real challenge for kids living in remote, rural and regional communities, not in getting something better than anybody else when it comes to education, but in getting the same sort of opportunities as our city kids,” Mr Sinclair said.

“All of us have a role to play in giving those 250,000 young Australians that chance.”

Contact:

Ian Sinclair (03) 5443 7300